20 March 2012

Poor Baby

Vacation took a little twist yesterday throwing us a curve ball that we could not have anticipated. New Kid got sick and it is a sickness we have not had to deal with in the nearly 8 years we have been parents. On Sunday night she woke up about 10:30 having thrown up in her Pack 'n' Play. Thank goodness she was sleeping in our room because she did not cry and I was still awake and heard what was happening. When I leaned over to check on her she was all smiles. We got her out and cleaned her up and she went back to sleep as if nothing had happened.

Yesterday we took the girls to an area in-home daycare where they had stayed last year when we were here to snowboard. Everything was going fine until we got a text (while we were on our way to pick them up) that New Kid had had a huge diaper blow out and then barfed up her snack. Clearly something was amiss. We pumped her full of liquid and gave her some plain pasta for dinner and off to bed she went tired but happy. She awoke crying around 12:30am and I quickly scooped her up just in time for her to blow chunks in my hand. I got her to the sink and then to the toilet where she got a bit more out of her system.

I share this story mainly for one reason and that is to always remember how adorable she looked standing over the toilet calmly throwing up and then pretending to spit into the bowl. Did you know that the height of the toilet is perfect for a toddler to stand and vomit. We went through this exercise 3 times between 12:30 and 1:00am. Each time she would throw up and then look up at us with her most pleasing smile. We would clean her up and put her back in bed where she would quietly drift off to sleep.

We strung together about 3 hours of sleep only to be awakened at 4:00am to more crying. This time it was her diaper that needed changing and she was not as happy to have her PJs removed in the cold of night as she was to stand over the toilet pretending to spit. So here I sit in the condo with a sleeping toddler and an overactive four-year-old . . . it is going to be a long day.

There are many aspects to this story that amaze me but the biggest one is that this was our first (but I doubt not our last) experience with an "up-in-the-night" type sickness like this. Luckily our children have proved resilient and have rarely let illnesses keep them up at night. Outside of car trips (and the time The Boy ate a tube of toothpaste) we have had only one other time where one of our kids has thrown up and that was actually last month. On President's Day when the kids were out of school The Boy complained of being cold and nauseous around 10:00am and then projectile vomited in his bed about an hour later. He ran a fever, took a nap, sat comatose on the couch for a few hours, and then was good as new and able to eat a normal dinner by 6:00pm.

Parenting is about rolling with it and we sure are rolling this week!

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